Where you stand depends on where you sit: The challenge of being an academic turned Head of State

The European Studies Centre hosted St Antony’s College alumnus and President of Iceland Guðni Thorlacius Jóhannesson on 27 February 2024. President Jóhannesson discussed his experience as a historian who challenged the Icelandic orthodoxy on the so-called “Cod Wars” – a series of maritime disputes between Iceland and the United Kingdom on fishing rights in the north Atlantic – and the challenges and dilemmas between the academic and the politician on the role of history, academia, patriotism, and nationalism. The event was chaired by Othon Anastasakis, Director of the European Studies Centre.

President Jóhannesson started by discussing his experience at St Antony’s. After a few anecdotes about his time at the College and his meetings with his supervisor, Professor Anne Deighton, he focused his discussion on his dissertation topic: Cod Wars. The Cod Wars had been the quintessential heroic tale of Icelandic national unity and had demonstrated that the strong will of a small country was mightier than the military power of the United Kingdom. They have been etched into the collective memory of Icelanders as a triumphant story and had become part of Icelandic collective identity.

The young Icelandic historian with an Oxford degree challenged that version of the history of the Cod Wars and – consequently – Icelandic pride. As a historian, Jóhannesson had been drawn by myths in order to deconstruct them and offer a more critical and objective perspective of history. He had seen the misuse of history through the creation of national myths by Icelandic politicians, and was thus entering into the midst of narrative battles on the role of the academic versus the role of the politician and between the passionate national truth and the impassionate objective truth. The perception of academics by the general public and the politicians in Iceland had been one of the detached and elitist professional pontificating from their ivory tower with verbiage that was alien to the common folk. They were seen with suspicion, and even more so were those “revisionist” historians who dared to challenge that national consensus.

Building European defence through crises

The European Studies Centre, together with Southeast European Studies at Oxford (SEESOX), hosted Marilena Koppa, Professor at Panteion University in Athens, Greece. The seminar was held on 22 February 2023 and was chaired by Othon Anastasakis, Director of the European Studies Centre and of SEESOX.

Koppa’s presentation was based on her book The Evolution of the Common Security and Defence Policy: Critical Junctures and the Quest for EU Strategic Autonomy published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2022. The research for the book had taken place before the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and Koppa presented her analysis on the needs and challenges to build European defence by taking into account this latest crisis that the European Union has had to face.

Koppa noted that her time as a member of the European Parliament, when she also held the position of Coordinator of the Socialist and Democrat Group at the Subcommittee on Security and Defence, had prompted her to research European defence policy as an academic. In her presentation she discussed the origins of European defence, its evolution through crises, and its needs for the future.

Koppa argued that the EU’s Common and Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) sought to build European military capabilities that in the long-term would make the Union a global actor, but it did not seek to provide collective defence, which has been a NATO mission. The defence focus of the CSDP would be to prevent crises outside EU borders from reaching the Union.

What explains the enduring success of far-right parties in Europe?

Katja Salomo, Dahrendorf Postdoctoral Fellow at the European Studies Centre and postdoctoral researcher at the Social Science Centre Berlin (WZB), presented her preliminary findings on success of far-right parties in the European Studies Centre seminar organised on 20 February 2024. The seminar was chaired by Tim Vlandis, Associate Professor of Comparative Public Policy at the Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford.

Salomo started her presentation by mentioning the broad social conditions that has given rise to extremism and anti-democratic politics, and then focused her discussion on the conditions that make far-right parties more successful.

Salomo had conducted a sensitivity analysis to examine the success of far-right parties in Europe by looking at 30 countries in the last two decades. She defines far-right parties as ultra-conservative and anti-migration political organisations. She traces their antecedents in the late 1970s / early 1980s. Furthermore, Salomo contends that far-right parties gained a bit more ground in the early 1990s, plateaued in the mid-1990s, slightly decreased during 2000-2005, and have been increasing in popularity ever since.

Concerning the reasons that explain the rise trend of far-right parties, Salomo argued that immigration has been a contributing factor after the 1980s. She also discussed briefly the role of mistrust at the individual and societal level, as well as social grievances and social status. These factors influence voting behaviour that is more favourable to far-right parties, according to Salomo.

Energy transition, financial markets and new EU interventionism

On 13 February 2024, the European Studies Centre (ESC) hosted Federica Genovese, Professor of Political Science and International Relations at the Department of Politics and International Relations, University of Oxford and Thomas Hale, Professor in Public Policy (Global Public Policy) at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford. Genovese presented a recent paper she has co-authored that examines the effect of EU policy intervention through sanctions and green industrial policy on investor decision and the revenues of green and brown energy companies. Hale discussed the paper and its findings, while Tim Vlandis, Associate Professor of Comparative Public Policy at the Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford, chaired the seminar.

The paper focuses on the implications of EU interventionism on energy companies in Europe, but flows from broader questions on the challenges to mobilise capital for energy transition and decarbonisation and to get private investors to finance the energy transition. Starting from these broader concerns, the paper seeks to assess how markets and investors react to EU signals and interventions.

Since the Barroso Commission the EU outlined its vision to be a global champion to tackle greenhouse gases and implement climate neutral policy. EU climate policy in the early 2000s relied heavily on market mechanisms (e.g. the 2005 emission trading scheme and the 20-20-20 package). Genovese argued that while these measures entailed approving market-oriented regulatory packages, the climate policy approach taken by the Von der Leyen Commission, with the Green Deal at the centre, has been different. The Commission has been testing out across a broad range of policy areas the previously discredited ‘interventionist’ (state-led) approach, which started with the Covid-19 pandemic response and, more prominently, after the Ukrainian crisis through, for example, REPoweEU, CBAM (Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism).

Paella pans and petrol cans: Noise-making and Charivari in contemporary Spain

On 6 February 2024, the European Studies Centre (ESC) invited Matthew Kerry, Associate Professor of History at Jesus College, University of Oxford, to discuss his article on pot-banging as a feature of political protest in Spain and, more broadly, his research on Spanish sociocultural history. Tom Buchanan, Professor of History at Kebble College, University of Oxford, joined the panel to discuss Kerry’s article. Paul Betts, Professor of Modern European History at St Antony’s College, University of Oxford, chaired the seminar.

The article, “The death of ‘traditional’ charivari and the invention of pot-banging in Spain, C.1960–2020,” published in January 2024 by Past & Present, had been a pandemic-writing project for Kerry. In his presentation, he indicated that he had wanted to probe into underlying assumptions that consider the use of noise-making as a form of political protests during the 2010s to a centuries-long tradition of charivari (or rough music culture), examine how we understand collective action, and explore the differences between two forms of rough music – cencerrada and cacerolada – in Spain.

Cencerrada comes from cencerro (or cowbell); cacerolada/cacerolazo comes from cacerola (or saucepan). Political pot-banging is called cacerolada/cacerolazo, whereas a traditional form of rough music – or charivari – is called cencerrada. The article traces the history of rough music in the twentieth century and the history of pot-banging.